Week One Done

Well, we've been in Texas for a whole week now as a whole family. Doug and I continue to look around in shock that we are actually here. The scenery down here is so different than that of the PNW. The trees are different, the ground is different, the sunsets look different, and the bugs and creatures are definitely different. Both Texas and Washington are beautiful, but definitely in different ways. So, here is a recap of our first week here. Monday was of course Labor Day and Tuesday was a busy day. We came out to the lake to set up the trailer, did some driving around and took the kids to the new house. The realtor met us at the new house so the kids were able to see inside. They of course ran straight upstairs to claim which room they wanted. There was no arguing, which was nice, and they all decided pretty quickly. Bethany claimed the largest of the 3 bedrooms, although all the rooms are fairly nice in size. The girls both ended up with small walk-in closets, which will suit them nicely. JD ended up with the middle room with the regular closet, but there is plenty of room for him to run around and play his nerf basketball in there. Tuesday was a fairly busy day for me. I started the day by registering Bekah at her new school. It was so weird working with any school other than Fort Stevens or YMS, but they were very nice. After an hours worth of paperwork she was all set and ready to go for Wednesday to be her first day. I then went to the district office for my interview for a part time position with the school district, which I did get. Yay! Hoping to start next week. After that I went and repeated the same lengthy paperwork process at JD's school and then tried to get Bethany registered, but they have a deadline of 10am, so she would start on Wednesday morning after we dropped the other 2 off. After that, Doug and I took the kids to buy school supplies. I will definitely advise anyone needing school supplies to not wait until 2 weeks after school starts. It was nearly impossible to find everything they needed. Wednesday was definitely bitter-sweet. It was so exciting for the kids to start their new schools, but it also made us miss the familiarity of our Yelm routine. The kids handled the first day at a different school fantastically. We were so proud of them! They all came home that afternoon full of excitement about what this year will bring. There are many differences about the schools here. First of all, the Elementary school has a very smooth, safe and coordinated pick-up and drop off. When you go to drop off in the morning you get in the car line and the line keeps moving. As you move to the sidewalk area, there is someone standing there to open your car door and let your child out. They then close the door and you are expected to keep moving! Long gone are the days of the crazy Fort Stevens drop off where cars are parked, parents sit there and watch their kids walk in and other cars are cutting in line. Then, in the afternoon, you have a bright orange card with your childs name on it, as you pull through the line someone with a walkie-talkie calls your childs name to someone in the building and then as you get to the sidewalk someone is walking your child out of the school, opens your door, lets your child in, closes the door and then, again, you keep moving! So weird, but it works! JD is in an intermediate school for 5th and 6th graders. He is changing classes just like middle school, which is so strange. Thinking of him having 6 different teachers is very overwhelming for me, but so far he is handling it ok. We will be having a 504 meeting sometime soon so we can discuss any modifications he may need, but I am excited to see how this schedule will allow him to grow. Bethany's school is HUGE! It is only 7th and 8th graders but has 1100 students! She is very excited about all of the club opportunities and all the different classes they offer. She is in a theater arts class that will have 4 productions over the year and she will get high school credit. So exciting! The biggest struggle for her is how intense it is. So much more is expected of the students out here to include things like actual grading of homework. If you miss questions on your homework it will affect your grade. Once she has all of that figured out, she will do great! Well, that's all I will bore you with today. We are adjusting well, we just can't wait to get into our house! I will write more next week:-)

Big Changes

I’ve been trying to find time over the last couple of weeks to sit and write a blog post, but time has flown by. I can’t even believe the whirlwind of events that have taken place since mid-July. On July 18th Doug and I flew down for our trip to Vegas not knowing that we would be returning to Yelm with big news and big changes. That Monday we received the call that we had been expecting for over a year, that Doug was being offered the position at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. We’ve been anticipating him getting this position for quite some time, but had honestly gotten to the point where we were moving on with our lives in Yelm. I know to some, this move came as a big surprise. People have been shocked and have said that it all happened too fast. For us, this move has been on our minds for 3 years. It all started when we spent the summer down in San Antonio 3 years ago. It was then that we even began to consider living anywhere other than Washington. We felt at home in Texas. We loved the people, the culture, and the activities and yes, even the weather. Well, maybe Doug didn’t love the weather, but the rest of us really enjoyed lots of pool time and lots of sunshine. Doug also loved being at headquarters. He loved the challenge that came with being there and loved thinking about all he could accomplish there if given the opportunity. To go back to getting back from our trip to Vegas….we immediately jumped right into the moving process. First on the list was telling the kids. Then we started telling friends and family. We also started tying up loose ends with all of our commitments. Most of you as our friends and family know that we are so involved in so many areas of our lives and ending all of those commitments has been difficult. We said goodbye to the Enfield clan, which was very hard. We have also been getting our house ready for new people to live there and went on a house hunting trip to find our new home. This last week we had packers and movers in and out of our home and we have said more goodbyes than we can even count. There is so much we are going to miss about our lives in Washington. We are going to miss our family. Having our kids grow up with so many aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents has been such a blessing. They are better people because of all of you! We are going to miss our friends, who we also consider family. You have all loved us and supported us and have helped our children to have such wonderful lives. We are going to miss having cows in our backyard and living in a town with only 5 stop lights. We are going to miss going into Walmart or Safeway and always seeing someone we know. We are going to miss our baseball, fastpitch and basketball teams. We are going to miss Crossroads and all of our church family there. We will miss seeing Mt. Rainier all the time and we will probably even miss the rain. We are going to miss our house. That house has been an amazing home for us over the last 10 years. We have made so many memories there. The children have grown up there, we hosted small group there, numerous parties and get togethers and of course had the annual 3rd of July party. Saying goodbye to the house was hard, but as I reminded the kids, the house is only sticks and wood and paint, what matters most is the memories we made there and those we take with us. As long as we are together as a family, that is what counts. With all of that said my favorite thing to say this last week was I’m so ready to stop saying goodbye and start saying hello! We are getting ready to say hello to so many new wonderful people and things. We are looking forward to a new neighborhood with new neighbors and a pool! We are looking forward to learning more about our new church and making friends there. We are looking forward to exploring a new area and learning what it’s like to live in a city. We are looking forward to what living in a city will offer the kids as far as sports and theater and swimming and other fun extracurricular activities. We are looking forward to LOTS of sun. We are looking forward to finding fun new hang out places and finding our new favorite shopping areas. We are looking forward to making so many new memories in a fabulous new place. In closing I want to say that our home is always open! I know that this move has been hard on us and I know that it’s also been hard on those we love. There is an open invitation to anyone who wants to come and visit. Our lives would never have been the same without all of you and we would love to see you again!

On the road again...

Time to dust off this Blog again.  I think everyone knows by now that we are leaving the Pacific Northwest and heading out for Texas!  I got a job opportunity and we decided that this was the right move for our family.  Over the last month we have cleaned and gutted (furniture) to our Yelm home.  We have renters moving in shortly.  We flew down to San Antonio and bought a house in Cibolo, TX.  The packers are at our house right now shoving all our wordly possesions into boxes as I write this.  My wife and kids will be flying down there and staying with friends until I get there.  I will be driving the truck and travel trailer down there with the dog.  LONG trip, but this is really the best way to do it.  More to come through our adventures!

Adventures on the mountain

Well, I wanted to be able to get in all the details, so figured I would hop on here instead of doing just a regular facebook post. Most good stories start with "it was a dark and stormy night....". This story doesn't start this way, but pretty much ended up that way. We have been planning and waiting for our first trip out in our new trailer since the day we bought it. The whole family has been so excited. We planned our first trip out to go to Leavenworth,WA. For those of you not from here, it's a small Bavarian village located in the mountains. It's beautiful! Every weekend during December they have a tree lighting festival where the whole village lights up with Christmas lights. We've never been for it and were really excited to go. We found a cute little RV park right in town, made our reservations and made our plans. The first part of this adventure is that Bekah started not feeling well on Wednesday night. All of a sudden she was complaining of her head hurting and throat hurting. Thursday morning wasn't much better, so we both stayed home from school and pre-school. Since we were heading out of town the next day I decided to take her to the doctor. So glad I did because she was diagnosed with strep throat. She continued to get worse throughout the day but we started her on the antibiotics and alternating Tylenol and Advil. By Friday morning she was feeling quite a bit better. Thank goodness! So Doug and I continued to pack everything into the trailer and make our preparations. Bethany got home from school at 2 and we picked up JD early and left Yelm around 3:30. We headed north on I-5, hit highway 18 and headed towards I-90 to go over Snoqualmie pass. Snoqualmie pass was no problem, clear and dry! Doug and I had been checking the pass reports most of the week so we figured we would have no problems! After Snoqualmie we headed towards 97 north to Blewett pass. As we start heading up Blewett the snow really started coming down. This was very unexpected. I called Jeff and Angela to see how the pass was a couple hours earlier when they had gone over it and they said it was fine! Definitely not the experience we were having. We were skidding, losing traction, seeing cars spun out everywhere. We pulled over to the scene of an accident where there were a few firetrucks and police cars. Doug got out to ask what they thought about us making it up. The policeman told us to keep going up, just go carefully and slowly. So we did. We made it up a couple more miles.All of a sudden our truck wouldn't go forward anymore. We were completely losing traction. Doug again pulled over and we realized that we were stuck. Doug hopped out into the 2 degree snowy windy weather, turned the heat on in the trailer and told the kids and I to get in there. We were just in there and trying to start coming up with a plan when there was a knock on the door. A very nice man named Bill had stopped to see if we needed help. Bill and Doug had found that we blew a tire on the trailer and that was probably why we lost traction. For the next hour Doug and Bill tried to change the tire, but had no luck. Apparently the tire jack used on a trailer is a different size than a car, which we know now:-) Bill said good luck and was on his way. While they were trying to fix the tire I was in the trailer trying to call 911 with spotty cell coverage. They transferred me to state patrol and the guy I spoke with on the phone didn't seem like there was anything they were going to be able to do. So, we decided to unhook the trailer, leave it, and head over the pass with just the truck. The plan at this point was to get the kids and I somewhere safe, Doug was going to get what he needed to fix the tire and chains for the truck tires and go back and get it. We got about 3 miles up the road and our phone rang. It was state patrol. They were at the trailer and said they could help change the tire, so we turned back around and went back to the trailer. The kids and I stayed in the truck while Doug and the very nice state patrol officer changed the tire. After the tire was changed,and the trailer was hooked back to the truck we tried to get moving. At this point it had probably snowed more than 6 inches in an hour and no matter how hard Doug pushed on the gas the truck/trailer combo wasn't moving. It wasn't looking very good. It was by the total Grace of God that at that exact moment a guy named Chris was driving over the pass. He immediately pulled over and offered to tow us to the top of the summit. He had straps and strapped our rig up to his truck and pulled us out of the snow and up to the top of Blewett pass. When we reached the top of the summit we disconnected the straps and offered to follow us all the way down the mountain to Leavenworth. We rolled into the RV park around 11pm, about 4 hours later than we had anticipated, tired, hungry and cold. This story has taught us many lessons. Our first lesson is that if we are going to do winter camping it will be on our own side of the mountains! The biggest lesson is how we can serve and sacrifice for those around us. Bill and Chris didn't need to stop and help us, but they did. They didn't need to spend time out in the snowy stormy weather, but they did.They didn't do this for reward, but they did it to help a family in need. Such an amazing example. Overall, we are very happy with how the kids handled this whole ordeal. They behaved and didn't get whiny. We ended up having a great time in Leavenworth and took the LONG way home. We went south east to completely avoid Blewett pass. We can't wait for our next camping adventure as long as it's a warm fun one:-)

It's time for some pie.

So our last post was all about picking strawberries.  Well those berries turned into A LOT of jam, lots of snacks, strawberry cinnamon rolls, strawberry shortcake, and (my favorite) strawberry topping for some banana pancakes. But at church on Sunday, somebody left this on counter in the kitchen!

Rhubarb! I asked to whom it belonged and the kitchen manager said it was just left by somebody so if I wanted it - go for it!

My grandma passed away 15 months ago.  We all miss her dearly and it was the joy of her life to make and bake food for people. It was always the joy of my life to eat that food.  Her strawberry rhubarb pie was my favorite - it wasn't even close. She used to make these large flat pies that were the size of a large pizza and cooked on a pizza pan.  Very thin, but there was plenty of the best part - the crust!

Here's where we started:

Pie Crust

2 1/3 cups whole wheat flour

1 cup (2 sticks) butter

1/2 teaspoon of salt

Cold water as needed to make doughy (used about 1/3 cup)

Mix everything but the water til it's crumbly.  Add water till it was like play dough.

Wrap dough in plastic and stash in the fridge for an hour until its solid enough to work with.

After chilling, cut dough in half and roll out for the pie pan.

Okay, so my wife made the filling.  It's 2 cups of strawberries, 2 cups of rhubarb, 2 cups of sugars, and some flour/cinnamon/nutmeg/love/deliciousness.

Now a little lattice work, egg wash, and sprinkle sugar.  Ready for the oven at 400 for 50 mintes.

Looks good.  I'll give you the verdict tomorrow.

Doug



Berry Picking!

Our Summer is off to a great start. The kids have only been out of school for 2 weeks and we've already completed our first trip of the season. We went out to New Jersey to visit my family and celebrate my grandmother's 90th birthday. It was awesome! As we enter a week with not much going on, we decided to do some strawberry picking. We are so lucky to have Spooner Berry Farms so close to us. They have the most delicious strawberries! Having a lot of local, fresh produce is crucial to living a real-food lifestyle, so we are excited to stock up on frozen berries, homemade jam and even some treats like pie filling. The girls were very excited to go berry picking. JD wasn't too sure. If we do anything that doesn't involve some sort of game or competition, he usually doesn't want to do it. So...the whole morning he's begging me to go bowling. Once we got to the farm and started picking he exclaimed..."This is the best place ever" :-) It was a great morning getting out of the house and picking some yummy berries. Next on the list is blueberries. Doug found a great place that we hope to hit up this week. Talk to you all soon!

Where Does The Time Go?

Wow! I really can't believe it's June and I really can't believe the kids are almost out of school. Time sure does fly when you're having fun, or just super busy like us! Here are some updates on what's going on in the Enfield household and some things we are looking forward to this summer. The kids have all done really well in school this year. Bethany of course continues to be at the top of her class. She has been an Eagle leader (student leader) at school this year as well as the only girl in the highly capable program this year. Rebekah has had an amazing year of kindergarten. It's so awesome to listen to her read and to watch her do addition and subtraction. The end of her kindergarten year is so bittersweet. We are excited that she is moving on, but yet again it's hard to watch the youngest become so independent. We are also sad that this is our last year with Ms. McDaniel! She has been the best kindergarten teacher for all 3 of our kids. We have been so blessed to have her involved with each of our kids lives. JD had a wonderful year this year in 3rd grade. He was definitely blessed with his fabulous teacher, Mrs. Walters. It takes a special personality to deal with JD sometimes and she definitely gets "him". Sports of course has continued to be a huge part of our everyday life, as we try to find lots of ways to keep the kiddos active and healthy. Bethany and JD both did basketball this winter. JD is now in baseball and he is doing a fabulous job pitching. He is still working on hitting in the kid pitch league, but continues to improve. Rebekah loves soccer and we are doing that right now. One of the biggest changes around here is that we are trying to follow a whole foods/real food lifestyle here at home. We cleaned out the pantry, fridge and freezer of all processed foods, including anything with white flours and white sugars. I wish I had taken a picture to show you what we ended up donating to the food bank. It was a lot! It has been a very exciting change and now that we are over a month into it I think it will be a permanant way of life around here. Of course there will be the occasional treats here at home and outside of home, but overall this is a change for the better for all of us! I'm still working on how this will work with my couponing and freezer cooking, but I'm just trying to take it one step at a time:-) Lots of big things going on for the summer that I will be sure to write about. First off, we are headed to New Jersey in 2 weeks to celebrate my grandmother's 90th birthday. So excited to see my family that we haven't seen in several years. After that the kids will all go to camp, JD has baseball camp and then we head back out to North Carolina to visit with my mom and then the big trip to Disney World. 18 months in planning and saving and we are going! So excited! I hope to get back on here more often as so many great things happen every day! Love to you all!